1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a medical test kit, and more particularly relates to a urine test kit comprising a plurality of chemical compositions for testing urine glucose, urine protein, urine bilirubin, urine bilinogen, pancreatic amylase, urine hemoglobin, urine calcium, urine nitrite, urine ketone, and urine pH, wherein the urine test kit employs simple procedures and provides a convenient and indicative measure, which is capable of showing a health condition of a user and serving as a preliminary screening test for a number of chronic disease.
2. Description of Related Arts
Diseases may not be a health hazard if we are capable of discovering or recognizing the existence of the diseases at an early stage. This is difficult because this means that we are able to listen to the signals from our bodies which may be insignificant to our feelings. A more reliable and scientific way is to having a body check in a clinic or in a hospital on a regular basis, but this is time consuming and expensive, and this may also employ complicated laboratory tests which require artificial sample extraction from our body, such as blood extraction, with the inherent risks such as tools and equipment contamination which may result in transmission of a disease. For a healthy person who is asymptomatic, it may not worth to take this risk of a body check.
Urine is an ideal indicator for many tests and is also a very good alternative to many blood tests. The chance of contamination is low and the large number of components in urine are good indicators to different diseases. However, problems of urine storage and urine testing methods make it undesirable to use urine as a sample for chemical analysis. Special storage arrangement for urine is required to prevent the oxidation of active components in urine or the photochemical reaction occurred under sunlight. On the other hands, in order to obtain a precise and representative result, a highly sensitive urine testing method must be used. Thus, the existing methods either require a very high precision measuring machine or a manual laboratory test conducted by a skillful technician. It is impossible for a person to carry out the urine test by himself for obtaining a preliminary screening test result when the health of the person is in doubt, or for a patient to carry out the urine test by himself for monitoring his disease. In case of those patients suffered from chronic illness, it is especially important that self-monitoring of their health is made possible, or a comprehensive health testing method is provided such that they can easily obtain their health conditions which is crucial for having good control of their chronic disease and preventing complications which is more serious induced by poor control of their chronic disease.
Traditional medical tests employing laboratory tests with chemical analysis are highly recognized as being effective, consistent, and reliable over the world. Medical tests are usually required to be carried out under a special environment, such as a laboratory in a hospital, a clinic, or a health center, and the tests are conducted by a specialist or a laboratory technician. However, since the traditional medical tests usually are conducted manually, require a long time period, acquire a series of complicated steps, require the use of testing solution having a short storage period, and employ heating or boiling steps which may induce a predetermined level of danger, the traditional medical tests employing laboratory tests, are gradually replaced by test machines. For example, many urine tests are now conducted by the use of automatic urine biochemical testing apparatus.
Though most medical tests for the presence of components in the urine are capable of being conducted in a laboratory, it is very important to provide self-administered medical tests which is cost effective and time saving, acting as a preliminary indicator for health of the general public. In this way, the early stage detection of disease which allows immediate treatment of the disease will highly reduce the chance of development of the more serious disease. This early awareness of the disease is an important warning signal which allows a patient to identify the initiate onset of a disease, such that the patient may actively alter his lifestyle to prevent any development of disease, to rectify any bad habits which is harmful to his health, and to self monitoring his health. On the other hand, the patient is able to consult a doctor and receive suitable treatment at an early stage of a disease, which in turn will highly increase the chance of curing the disease.
Self administered medical tests also allow a patient to have a better understanding of his health conditions, persuading him to face his disease and guiding him to realize any effects resulted from his acts in his daily life. The self administered medical tests results are good reminder to the patient of his health conditions which can positively guiding the patient to follow his treatment plan and hence highly increase the chance of recovery. Furthermore, the active monitoring of treatment with self administered medical tests can reduce the chance of inappropriate treatment because the self administered medical tests can reflect the present health conditions and the body's response to the treatment immediately.
It is especially true for outpatients having those illnesses required continuous management and self-control by themselves. In the disease development pathway, starting from healthy to early stage of disease and to chronic disease, further developing to serious disease, and finally to the end of life due to disease, self-administered tests play a very important role in control and management of disease, and hence preventing the development of more serious complications and diseases in the disease development pathway.
Furthermore, self administered medical tests can also reduce the dependence of patients, initiating a medical revolution towards a two ways management, and reduce the medical expenses. The patient is allowed to put an effort towards his treatment and lessen the burden of the medical practitioners, which in turn lessen the stress of the ever heavy workload of the medical practitioners and hence reserving the resources for the need. Moreover, the two ways management of disease is much more effective and efficient because the key to recovery depends heavily on the patient himself, while the self administered medical tests can provide him a better understanding of his health and serve as a guideline towards recovery.
Diabetes mellitus is a worldwide common disease that the early stage and the asymptomatic period are difficult to diagnosis in general clinical practices. Diabetes is a chronic disease, and without proper treatment, diabetes will lead to the development of serious complications in 15 to 20 years including cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease, hypopsia, eye degeneration, and high blood viscosity symptom. Patients suffering from diabetes are usually not aware of the disease and unable to discover the disease unless serious complications have been developed after many years. Present diagnosis of the disease rely heavily on the renal blood glucose level with the threshold value of blood glucose level 160 mg %. However, common glucose tests, including single blood glucose tolerance test, single blood glucose test, and single intravenous blood glucose test, are inadequate for diagnosis of the early stage of diabetes, and require the patients to go to the hospitals or clinics for blood extraction and testing with sophisticated apparatuses or meters, while personal continuous daily examinations and monitor on a regular basis are not possible, convention diagnoses are inadequate and insufficient to provide a reliable and realistic method for acting as an initial screening of the disease, even for those in the high risk class.
Kidney disease is another common disease which is difficult to be detected during the early kidney impairment and the asymptomatic period except using medical test analysis. Many diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes mellitus, rheumatic fever will impair cardiovascular systems especially the blood capillary including the glomerular capillary. The effect of high blood pressure, diabetes mellitus and rheumatic fever will gradually lead to the development of kidney failure, that the low molecular protein, such as the albumin, will undergo abnormal filtration process. If the situation is not recognized immediately, without any suitable treatment the seriousness of the disease will be increased which will give rise to the excretion of large molecules. Kidney failure is a serious disease which will endanger the life of the patient.
Liver disease is another common disease. Liver is a complicated and important organ which is crucial to many physiological process including detoxication and elimination of hemoglobin. Since liver is a large organ generally with a mass of 1.5 kg in an adult, with a high metabolic activity and a high cell regeneration ability, it is not easy to diagnosis any localized damage to the liver with the common convention liver function tests unless a substantial portion of the liver is affected and the situation is serious. Existing indicators for liver function are urine bilirubin and urine bilinogen which are the metabolites produced from liver.
Substantive liver damage will affect the absorption, binding, and excretion of bilirubin. Narrowing or damage of bile ductile or bile duct may lead to back flow of bilirubin into the blood stream, filtered in the bowman capsule and hence the excretion of bilirubin through urine. On the other hand, liver damage will also lead to decreased efficiency of bilinogen metabolism and hence increased bilinogen in blood stream and hence in urine.
Blockage of bile duct or bile ductile will lead to obstructive jaundice in which the skin acquires a characteristic yellow appearance due to the backflow of bilirubin into the blood stream and the retention of bilirubin in the blood, that the bilirubin is then filtered in kidney and excreted in urine. Since bilirubin is absence or deficient in digestive tract, the formation of bilinogen will then be substantially reduced or stopped.
Liver is also responsible for the elimination of hemoglobin from the used red blood cells which will lead to the production of bilirubin. When the amount of free bilirubin produced is exceeding the capacity of the liver, the free bilirubin having a low solubility cannot be eliminated in liver and excreted in urine through filtration in kidney. On the other hand, the overload of liver to process the absorbed urine bilinogen will also lead to the increase of bilinogen in urine.
Pancreas disease is another common disease which is susceptible to misdiagnosis, in particularly, acute pancreatitis is a kind of common acute disease of high morality rate. Since the symptom of acute pancreatitis is severe abdominal pain, it is easily to be misdiagnosis in general medical practice. On the other hand, chronic pancreatitis exhibits symptoms of digestive disease which requires pancreas function test for diagnosis.
Internal bleeding of our body is another health hazard which is common but difficult to diagnosis at an early stage or in the asymptomatic period. This is a chronic disease which takes time to develop into a more serious disease, and if diagnosis is made possible during the early stage or the asymptomatic period, the chance of curing of the disease is highly increased.
Calcium imbalance is another common disease. The total calcium of an adult is generally 1 kg which is about 1.5% of the body weight while 99% of the calcium is found in bone. It is difficult to discover calcium imbalance since X-ray analysis can only detect the calcium loss in bone when the calcium level has already been reduced by 30%. While the treatment for calcium loss is simple and effective at the early stage, it is not easy to diagnosis at the early stage.
Urinary tract infection is another common disease, in particularly for married female. It is a chronic disease which is not difficult to cure at its early stage. However, present medical care is still unable to control the medication in according to the real time condition of the patient.
It is shown that a variety of chronic diseases are not hazardous and critical to health if suitable treatment is available and provided at an early stage. Therefore, a medical kit which is easy and convenience to operate, and at the same time, providing a method of use, is capable of promoting self health care and enabling the discovery of a variety of chronic disease at an early stage. Hence, the chance of recovery is highly increased and the development of serious complications is avoided or reduced.